Chiquita banana company sued for murdering over 4,000 Colombians.

Sent in by JenK. Item. And more info here.

Despite some efforts by Chiquita to clean up its act in recent years, its long history of human rights abuses is coming back to haunt the company. Chiquita is being sued by the families of more than 4,000 Colombians murdered by illegal armed groups funded by Chiquita.

More than 100 lawyers have filed the suits for different groups of victims, but are all working together, according to Colombia Reports, to make one giant case against the company.

The Irish Times writes, "The civil cases follow Chiquita's admission in 2007 that it paid $1.7 million (€1.2 million) to the AUC between 1997 and 2004 and acknowledged previous payments to other groups."

That admission was preceded by a secret Justice Department investigation, at which time Chiquita was represented by Eric Holder—yes, the current Attorney General. Chiquita was fined $25 million.